Value addition to carbon dioxide emitted from the cement kilns

Emission of carbon dioxide is one of the most serious environmental concerns of the cement industry. Various steps have been taken by the industry to reduce the specific emission of carbon dioxide but with all the measures it appears that the industry would not succeed to achieve the target of reducing the carbon dioxide emission by half, set for 2050, unless recourse is taken to the processes of carbon capture, storage and use (CCS/CCU). The CCS process in its present form is too capital and revenue intensive for the cement industry. Hence, the concerned research community is engaged in adding value to the captured carbon dioxide so that the process turns out to be viable. In this context, several technologies are being researched upon to develop novel cements and building products by utilizing the captured carbon dioxide. The other strategy is to adopt efficient carbon capture technologies and its recycling through transformation into fuels and chemicals. Since the utilization technologies for captured carbon can have multiple dimensions, only a few selected potential technologies in development are discussed in this paper.

Author: A.K. Chatterjee

Section: Ecology and safety

Keywords: СО2 emission, capture, storage, use